One woman says she was accused of stealing at Walmart when she put the seasonings she purchased into her purse.
In a video with over 74,000 views, TikToker Brittany Hotte (@socialbrit) sits in the driver's seat of her car after shopping at Walmart. She takes several grilling seasonings out of her tote bag.
"I got seven of these big bottles. That's literally all I bought," she says. "I checked out and scanned each and every one, put them on the side [of the register], got my receipt, and put them all into my purse because I didn't bring a shopping bag with me."
Soon after checking out, she says a Walmart worker stopped her and accused her of not scanning one of the seasonings.
"She's like, 'How many do you have? I counted eight,'" Hotte says. "So I look at my receipt, and it says seven. She was rude about it."
Hotte takes all of the seasonings out of her purse. The number of seasonings matches the receipt.
"I get that she's doing her job. But she didn't have to be so rude about it right off the bat and then not apologize," Hotte says.
In a follow-up video, she notes that her local Walmart doesn't have shopping bags available at check-out. So she had no choice but to put the seasonings in her purse.
"In some states, plastic bags at grocery stores are outlawed," she explains. "Which is why when I was buying these spices, I just put them in my purse."
"So, in my case, it wasn't more suspicious that I was putting them in my purse," she continues.
Hotte isn't the first customer to notice Walmart's tightening theft prevention strategies. The Daily Dot has previously reported on several incidents in which shoppers have been followed by "secret shoppers" or accused of stealing at checkout while shopping at the retailer.
Other theft prevention strategies include new shelves with built-in alarms, locked displays, and stricter return policies.
Many shoppers criticized the retailer for these strategies in the comments.
"According to Walmart, everyone is a thief that walks through the front doors until they determine you’re not," one alleged.
Other Walmart shoppers shared their experiences with being falsely accused of stealing at the retailer.
"I was accused of stealing a case of water. I said 'If I’m going to steal, it’ll be something much better than water.' Then, I passed the receipt over," one said.
"Someone saw me put an angel tree tag in my coat pocket and I was accused of stealing. They were awful, so I let them call the police to deal with it because i knew what was in my pocket. The manager apologized but I have not shopped at Walmart since," another wrote.
"Once I got arrested over my daughter who was 2 threw a coloring book in the basket and didn’t get scanned bc I wasn’t even paying attention and I was 38 weeks pregnant and got released not long after," a third shared.
@socialbrit its called being nice and polite! It goes a long way! #walmart #stealing #storytime #rant ♬ original sound - ????Brittany | Reader & Homebody
The Daily Dot reached out to Hotte via email and TikTok direct message. We also contacted Walmart via press form.
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The post ‘There are no bags at the checkout’: Walmart shopper buys 7 spices, sticks them in purse at checkout. Then a worker steps in appeared first on The Daily Dot.
